<p>
</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/02/19/soldiers_face_neglect_at_medical_facility/[/url]”>http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/02/19/soldiers_face_neglect_at_medical_facility/</a></p>
<p>And this is the way we support those who have “fought for our freedom”? It’s disgraceful. There should be ample veteran’s funding for all the physical and psychological injuries for these young men and women returning from war.</p>
<p>Oops, duplicate. Sorry.</p>
<p>This thread needs to be bumped up. The situation at Walter Reed is indeed disgraceful. There should be a special tax on Halliburton and its subsidiaries and all other private companies that have profited from the war in Iraq. The proceeds should be specifically earmarked for spending on combat-damaged veterans.</p>
<h2>“There should be ample veteran’s funding for all the physical and psychological injuries for these young men and women returning from war.”</h2>
<p>Can we assume this will change since Democrats control both houses of Congress. ;)</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.americablog.com%5B/url%5D”>www.americablog.com</a> has a round up of stories about veteran’s affairs. </p>
<p>If you have time, at least please read the short summaries they have of each one. Even if you think you know a lot about veteran’s issues, you will find things that you didn’t know were happening, and will want to know.</p>
<p>You know…seriously…I agree; the treatment of veterans is terrible. They give their best and we reward them with our worst. But when my career Army father-in-law and his cohorts returned from Korea and then Viet Nam, they experienced the same treatment. There is no excuse for decades of this nonsense.</p>
<p>“Can we assume this will change since Democrats control both houses of Congress?”</p>
<p>Not with the President proposing a $3.5 billion dollar CUT in Veterans services.</p>
<p>My own family benefitted so much from the GI Bill. On one wage earner’s salary to support seven children, I don’t think my parents would have even been able to buy a house, much less take vacations or save for retirement, without the benefits from my father’s WWII service. </p>
<p>The situation with our vets today is completely unacceptable.</p>
<p>mini…this is what I don’t understand. The President can propose this nonsense 'til the cows come home, but Congress doesn’t have to approve it. And if Democratics in Congress hate the idea of troop surge, why don’t they CUT the funding for it, rather than passing ineffective ‘resolutions’?</p>
<p>It’s all smoke and mirrors imho. Bush loves Pelosi, and visa versa. I think the whole lot of 'em, Democrats and Republicans, meet in backrooms figuring out ways to cooperatively trash each other in order to gain political mileage while the idea of actually accomplishing something is furthest from their minds and hearts.</p>
<p>No Democrat here, so you’ve go me. Frankly, I look at the Dems as the party of intellectual bankruptcy; as opposed to the other one, the party of moral bankruptcy. peas in a pod.</p>
<p>(as for the funding, I think they are just working up the courage. But it doesn’t matter - the Prez will veto it even if it got to a vote.)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Because cutting the funding won’t bring them home. It will just put them in more danger where they are. The President starting sending the troops before the funding was in place. What does that tell you about his intentions if it isn’t forthcoming? </p>
<p>The administration is sending 21,500 more over, knowing that they won’t have the jammers, trucks, and armored vehicles they need. When we first invaded Iraq, there were guys digging through the garbage dumps looking for scraps of metal they could use to make makeshift armor for their Humvees. Do you remember what they were told when one of them the Sec of Defense asked why they couldn’t have real armor?</p>
<p>“Because cutting the funding won’t bring them home. It will just put them in more danger where they are.”</p>
<p>That’s political cant, and political cowardice on the part of the Democrats. If they cut the funding (which they can’t), the Pres can choose to use funding from elsewhere within his discretion, or bring the troops home. It doesn’t put ANY troops in danger (more so than they are now.)</p>
<p>And this is why I want to scream at conservatives who hurl phrases like, “You are filled with glee at the idea that America will fail” and “You don’t support the troops”.</p>
<p>This is disgusting slander. I support proper funding for the troops, in battle, and when they come home. </p>
<p>Look to the White House and you will find the individuals who don’t support the troops at all. They send them to be maimed, psychologically injured or killed, all the while providing inadequate protection for them while they are there, and insufficient veteran’s benefits and funding upon their return (if they make it back alive).</p>
<p>Where are our friendly conservatives, FF, HH, SJ, or any other of you…to come and defend the Commander and Chief, who cares so little about our troops?</p>
<p>PS the Dems are too mamby pamby to stand up to Bush and vote down the war spending. They don’t want to be seen as “soft on terror” or “against the troops”. So Bush will have a blank check, to continue this mayhem.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>He didn’t do that when the troops didn’t have adequate body armor. He didn’t do that when Patrick Murphy was patrolling Iraq in a Humvee with no doors. Why would he do it now?</p>
<p>He won’t. He will use whatever billions he needs to continue to fund the war machine though, no matter what rebukes he receives from Congress. Those rebukes are like little gnats…just shoo them away and forge ahead.</p>
<p>I ask, if he can simply redirect funding as you say, where will he find the needed billions? The military is already running on emergency funds. They are trying to keep their programs running while funding operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The military is trying to do more with less, everyday. The USAF, for example, is cutting 40,000 jobs in the next few years, so they can keep developmental research and current operations going.</p>
<p>I guess he could take more out of veterans benefits. He’s already proposing billions of dollars in cuts for veterans, even as the war creates more.</p>
<p>“I ask, if he can simply redirect funding as you say, where will he find the needed billions?”</p>
<p>Presidents make tough choices. That’s what they make the big bucks for.</p>
<p>According to Pelosi back in January:</p>
<p>WASHINGTON (CNN) – Nancy Pelosi, the new House speaker, cautioned President Bush Sunday that if he calls for additional U.S. troops to be sent to Iraq, he will have to show the Democratic-controlled Congress why even more money should be poured into the war.</p>
<p>Pelosi, a California Democrat, has long said her party will not pull funding for troops who are already in Iraq. But as news broke in recent days that Bush will likely call for a “surge” of troops into Iraq, she has indicated that Democrats will not simply say yes without asking a lot of questions. (Watch battle brewing over troop surge idea )</p>
<p>Speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation” Sunday, Pelosi said, “The American people and the Congress support” the troops currently in Iraq. </p>
<p>“We will not abandon them,” she said. “But if the president wants to add to this mission, he is going to have to justify it. And this is new for him because up until now the Republican Congress has given him a blank check with no oversight, no standards, no conditions.”</p>
<p>It was the next step in a message she laid out Friday in Baltimore.</p>
<p>“The president now knows that he does not have a blank check from Congress without any justification,” she said then. “He also knows that we will do what we must do to support our troops. Democrats have removed all doubt about that.”</p>
<p>The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, said he believes Bush will ultimately get the funding.</p>
<hr>
<p>Okay, clearly Pelosi thinks she can deny funding for a troop surge. And clearly Republicans think she won’t go through with it. So…imho…the resolution comes off as just a policital ploy on the part of Democrats to entice Republicans to break ranks ON THE RECORD and to give those Democrats who voted FOR the war a symbolic way to mitigate their responsibility.</p>
<p>Much ado about very little. The Prez will continue to lie, cheat, and deceive so that he can do what he wishes. The Dems will continue to whine in their intellectual bankruptcy. All will be well in the world.</p>
<p>People will die.</p>